A few more parts got brought out that haven't been around for a while. I'll be working on getting the cowl welded back on this week, and brought the doors out of storage, time to get to work on those also.

 

Okay. Cowl and dash is all clamped up. It's at this point in a man's life that he sits down, catches his breath, grabs a cold drink, and deeply contemplates the thought "Before I weld this damn thing back together, am I forgetting anything....". So, that's where I'm at. I'm going to do a few other odds and ends, think about it some more, and see if I come up with anything else, before redoing the 30 or 40 spot welds that hold all this together. Once its on, it's on.....

 

150 spot welds later, the cowl is back on! Now, just have to clean up the welds, and the last thing to weld on is the backing plate for the firewall. Then, it's on to the doors, they need some patching done.

 

Spent all day Sunday, grinding welds. Cowl is cleaned up, and ready for epoxy. I also installed the firewall backing plate with rosette welds, and cleaned those up.

 

Thanks guys! Got to work on the doors last night. the bottoms of both doors look pretty rough. But, with some work with the grinder, they cleaned up pretty well. I'll use some Metal Prep to remove the last of the rust.

 

Each door has a bad spot in the lower corner. So, started on the drivers side, cut out the section, cleaned it up, and shot the inside with Eastwoods Rust Encapsulator. I made a patch out of 18 ga., I'll be welding that on maybe tonight.

 

Welded the patches on for both doors. Also, patched the holes for the mirrors.

 

The passenger door had a pretty good crease in it, so did some work with the stud welder and slide hammer, should need just a little bit of filler to smooth it out.

 

I'm glad I decided to remove the paint all along the bottom of the doors. I found another spot that was under the paint, and barely visible on the back side of the pass. door. Patching that also.

 

And funny it was! I'm with you, I can do without rap music....

Finished up patching the last door yesterday. Worked out pretty slick. Sprayed the inside with Metal Prep, in preparation for the POR-15 coating.

 

I was hoping I could pull this dent with the stud gun and slide hammer. But, someones half-*** job in the past made that impossible. They had tried to pull it out using a sheet metal screw, and left the holes. So, I had to cut it out, and create a patch. Took me almost 2 hours to get this right, way too many angles at this spot. This patch should do it for the cab, it's now ready to start the body work.

 

Yeah, that's what I think when I do these patches. I usually have a pinhole or two I have to fill, also.Decided to use a chemical stripper on the outside of the doors, the paint seemed awful thick. Now I know why. Drivers door had a big former repair on it, and two coats of paint! Passenger side looked fine. So, got the stud welder out, and pulled out as much as I could. I'm going to sandblast the insides of the doors, hopefully later this week, coat the inner sections, and then shoot epoxy. Hopefully the weather cooperates!

 

Time to get busy on these doors. I wanted to blast around the inner edges of the doors, just because it's too hard to get the paint out mechanically, or with stripper around the edges. I built a small booth to blast them with the pot blaster in the driveway, to help keep the media from going all over. Worked like a charm.

 

I also blasted the hinges off in the cabinet. After replacing my old Craftsman angle die grinder (died on me on Sunday) with a Ingersoll Rand one, I cleaned up the doors. I'm going to shoot the doors around the edges with epoxy primer , and the hinges. Then, I'm going to hang the doors on the cab, and shoot the rest of them. I also have a few spots on the cab to touch up, so I'll do all of that at once.

 

Shot the hinges, and inner door sections with epoxy. I'll get them hung on the cab tonight, and finish the primer this weekend. I'll be rebuilding the hinges with new pins and springs also.